The Japanese government’s failure to warn citizens about radioactive danger put the entire city of Tokyo at health risk — and the rest of us as well. The report, which was written by an independent investigative panel established by the Rebuild Japan Initiative Foundation (published March 1 in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists), bluntly states that the much vaunted “absolute safety” of nuclear power is no more than a “twisted myth.”
The threat from nuclear power plants is twofold: grand scale catastrophe and continuing health problems connected with radioactive contamination in our air, water, soil and food supply — both short-term, high-level contamination and the long-term, low-level kind.
In Japan, radiation was detected in beef, milk, spinach, tea leaves and rice. And more than a dozen cities in the United States tested positive for fallout from Fukushima in their water supplies. Scientists found radiation from Japan in milk from Phoenix to Little Rock, Ark., to Montpelier, Vt. A year later, many questions about Fukushima’s operations remain unanswered.
Tepco may be the latest in a line of the nuclear businesses with a self-imposed mandate to suppress truth. Here in the United States, we have our own tightly held radioactive secrets.
Fallout at a Former Nuclear Weapon Plant – NYTimes.com
11 MarDevastation at Japan Site, Seen Up Close – NYTimes.com
16 NovAs we head into the holiday season remember nuclear radiation, the gift that keeps on giving:
While no one died in the nuclear accident, the environmental and human costs were clear during the drive to the plant through the 12-mile evacuation zone.
Untended plants outside an abandoned florist were withered, and dead. Crows had taken over a gas station. The dosimeters of the journalists on the bus buzzed constantly, recording levels that ticked up with each passing mile: 0.7 microsieverts in Naraha, at the edge of the evacuation zone, 1.5 at Tomioka, where Bavarian-style gingerbread houses had served as the welcome center for Fukushima Daiichi. It was there that Japanese visitors to the site were told a myth perpetuated over decades in Japan: that nuclear power is absolutely safe.
The level recorded just outside the center Saturday was 13 times the recommended maximum annual dosage for civilians.
At the plant, journalists, outfitted in full contamination suits, were kept aboard the bus in recognition of the much higher radiation levels there.
US: 75 Percent Of Nuclear Plants Have Leaked Radioactive Tritium (AP)
22 JunRadioactive tritium has leaked from three-quarters of U.S. commercial nuclear power sites, often into groundwater from corroded, buried piping, an Associated Press investigation shows.
The number and severity of the leaks has been escalating, even as federal regulators extend the licenses of more and more reactors across the nation.
via US: 75 Percent Of Nuclear Plants Have Leaked Radioactive Tritium (AP).
Exclusive Arnie Gundersen Interview: The Dangers of Fukushima Are Worse and Longer-lived Than We Think – Blogs at Chris Martenson
4 JunIs nuclear power a perpetual disaster machine?
The situation on the ground at the crippled reactors remains precarious and at a minimum it will be years before it can be hoped to be truly contained. In the near term, the reactors remain particularly vulnerable to sizable aftershocks, which still have decent probability of occuring. On top of this is a growing threat of ‘hot particle’ contamination risk to more populated areas as weather patterns shift with the typhoon season and groundwater seepage.
Some fear U.S. nuclear agency is playing ‘regulatory roulette’ – CNN.com
2 JunDoes “NRC” really stand for “Nuclear Radiation Commission”?
Monitoring wells in New Jersey’s Cohansey aquifer last year detected tritium levels of 4 million picocuries per liter, 200 times what the Environmental Protection Agency considers safe.
Such radioactive spills are a problem nationwide. More than half of the country’s 65 nuclear power plant sites have suffered significant tritium leaks or spills, according to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The worst was at the Braidwood plant, 60 miles southwest of Chicago, also owned by Exelon, which leaked more than 6 million gallons of contaminated water, causing some tritium to enter a drinking water well. …
“The NRC’s almost acting like they’re waiting till somebody dies till they enforce the regulation. Tombstone regulation — that’s too high a price to pay by Americans,” said David Lochbaum, director of the Nuclear Safety Project of the Union of Concerned Scientists.
via Some fear U.S. nuclear agency is playing ‘regulatory roulette’ – CNN.com.
Truth and Traditions 